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Poll: Majority says mainstream media publishes fake news

eohrnberger

eohrnberger

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Poll: Majority says mainstream media publishes fake news
Jonathan Easley - 05/24/17
Poll: Majority says mainstream media publishes fake news | TheHill
Nearly two-thirds of Americans say the mainstream press is full of fake news, a sentiment that is held by a majority of voters across the ideological spectrum.

According to data from the latest Harvard-Harris poll, which was provided exclusively to The Hill, 65 percent of voters believe there is a lot of fake news in the mainstream media.

That number includes 80 percent of Republicans, 60 percent of independents and 53 percent of Democrats. Eighty-four percent of voters said it is hard to know what news to believe online.

“Much of the media is now just another part of the partisan divide in the country with Republicans not trusting the ‘mainstream’ media and Democrats seeing them as reflecting their beliefs,” said Harvard-Harris co-director Mark Penn. “Every major institution from the presidency to the courts is now seen as operating in a partisan fashion in one direction or the other.”

President Trump has railed against the “fake news” media, casting the press as the “opposition party” and opening the White House to once-fringe outlets, to the frustration of the mainstream press.
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Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
 
Trumpers think all polls are fake, so what makes this one true?
 
eohrnberger said:
Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
Click to expand...
Is there a link to this poll?
 
eohrnberger said:
Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
Click to expand...

I have serious doubts. The MSM still thinks it's their duty to tell people what to think.
 
eohrnberger said:
Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
Click to expand...

I would have called them mad three years ago.
 
eohrnberger said:
Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
Click to expand...

This poll is useless due to the broad array of definitions for the term "mainstream media" (and "fake news" for that matter).
I would suggest that most of the Dems that answered in the affirmative were thinking about FOX, while GOP respondents were thinking of "liberal-leaning" sources.

What they should do is ask whether each specific source promotes "fake news" and they should correlate it with respondents' viewing habits.
Then they can ask some questions about what "fake news" even means.
 
I'm one who looks at all polls with suspicion. I've looked at this one, as well.

The typical method of skewing poll data is by oversampling some groups and undersampling other groups...with the group most used being Party affiliation.

Here are the numbers for this Harris poll:

Democrat: 36%

Republican: 32%

Independent: 29%

Other: 3%

Here is Gallup's figures on Party affiliation (as of May 3-7):

Democrats: 28%

Republicans: 29%

Independents: 40%

Party Affiliation | Gallup Historical Trends

In my opinion, these Harris poll numbers are not good...especially the Independent numbers...but I will say that the skew isn't as bad as I've seen in polls from Mainstream Media.

This poll is somewhat more believable...though not by much.
 
reinoe said:
I have serious doubts. The MSM still thinks it's their duty to tell people what to think.
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Indeed. You can see this in their, and their media's, constantly inflating the Russia collusion CT with their hyperventilating.
 
joG said:
The fact that it corresponds to what we are seeing?
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No it just conforms to your bias so you THINK it is true. Funny how trumpbots believe anything against media but not against trump.
 
Mycroft said:
I'm one who looks at all polls with suspicion. I've looked at this one, as well.

The typical method of skewing poll data is by oversampling some groups and undersampling other groups...with the group most used being Party affiliation.

Here are the numbers for this Harris poll:

Democrat: 36%

Republican: 32%

Independent: 29%

Other: 3%

Here is Gallup's figures on Party affiliation (as of May 3-7):

Democrats: 28%

Republicans: 29%

Independents: 40%

Party Affiliation | Gallup Historical Trends

In my opinion, these Harris poll numbers are not good...especially the Independent numbers...but I will say that the skew isn't as bad as I've seen in polls from Mainstream Media.

This poll is somewhat more believable...though not by much.
Click to expand...

A critical analysis, and fair enough. As polls aren't by any means 'solid', given the sample size and the composition of the sample size, it does, however, provide trending data over the longer course. From the longer course, the conclusion seems to be that the media is having credibility issues with the electorate.
 
Most folks don't talk about polls until they find one that agrees with what they already believe. I used to wonder why we were never 'polled' and then the telephone rang, I did not recognize the number and "click-up!" Wonder who that was????
 
eohrnberger said:
Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
Click to expand...

Jonathan Easley the author of this article is a right wing hack who works for sites like The Washington Times and Islamist Watch. Plus the wording of this article is funny. I'm surprised that the Hill employs him.

However, when taking a closer look at the poll, you will see that the MSM spreads fake news stat is actually one of the lowest out of each of the questions asked about fake news. The highest by far being fake news spread on Social Media which was 90% of the people asked. Then, 84% of the people said it is hard for them to determine what is real and what is fake news. The only thing lower is that people knowingly realize that most of their friends post fake news on social media at 52%.

So while a majority says there is a lot of fake news in the mainstream media, more of a majority say there is more fake news being spread on social media than in the MSM.
 
Mycroft said:
In my opinion, these Harris poll numbers are not good...especially the Independent numbers...but I will say that the skew isn't as bad as I've seen in polls from Mainstream Media.

This poll is somewhat more believable...though not by much.
Click to expand...

Are you saying that Harvard isn't MSM???
 
Before Trump came along I never ever heard the term 'fake news'. But now like the Parrots they are...........................................

I read it daily.
 
RickJames3000 said:
This poll is useless due to the broad array of definitions for the term "mainstream media" (and "fake news" for that matter).
I would suggest that most of the Dems that answered in the affirmative were thinking about FOX, while GOP respondents were thinking of "liberal-leaning" sources.

What they should do is ask whether each specific source promotes "fake news" and they should correlate it with respondents' viewing habits.
Then they can ask some questions about what "fake news" even means.
Click to expand...

That would be a really long poll, but I assume you are talking about the most popular sources. CNN/NBC VS Fox News/Breitbart??
 
ModerateGOP said:
That would be a really long poll, but I assume you are talking about the most popular sources. CNN/NBC VS Fox News/Breitbart??
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Yup. It's meaningless the way these questions appear to be framed.
 
Winston said:
Trumpers think all polls are fake, so what makes this one true?
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The fact that it's a harvard poll and not a CNN poll, of course. :lamo Trump doesn't have a problem with Harvard. So the Trumpers don't have a problem with Harvard.
 
I think we currently have two varieties of alleged/real fake news: Trumps obvious lies or "stretchers" or delusions or racist comments about crowd sizes, Muslims celebrating 9/11, Judge Curiel and even the weather. Here his comments about shooting someone and his supporters not minding apply. (Can a Trump supporter explain how this has affected their view of the man?)

Then one has the perceived bias of the MSM. I probably have opined this before, but I think the media has a perceived bias dating from its coverage of the civil rights movement and the Vietnam war. Many of the Walter Cronkite times came of age during the depression and the Jackie Robinson years, which taught them that capitalism doesn't work perfectly and that our country wasn't perfect. A lot of "kill the messenger" rhetoric from the right ensued. And then we have FOX news.

Right now, people are saying (which is sort of a Trumpism, but I have heard a couple of commentators noting it) that there is an old fashioned newspaper war between the failing Times and the Wash Post, each digging into the Russia stuff. Trump reporting is juicy stuff, and will continue til the big "reveal," or it peters out cause there is no "there" there. And Trump makes a perfect target: the image or reality is of a vain, narcissistic, fairly ignorant blowhard who has a background involving discrimination, screwing working people and lying like a rug. The guy decorates his establishments with gold, names everything after himself, and wants to adjust libel laws, for Chrissakes. He is a walking, talking parody of himself. Who wouldn't want to go after him? But you can bet that the Times and the Post still call the administration for comment and maintain their standards for sources and double checking. It's probably quite easy for them, given the wealth of material. And of course, unlike Trump, they print retractions.

On balance I'd go with the media that brought us Watergate and the civil rights movement rather than the guy who brought us Trump U.
 
From the same OP source...

"Trump’s job approval rating is at 45 percent approval and 55 percent disapproval in the latest Harvard-Harris survey."

"The Harvard-Harris survey found that 60 percent of all voters believe Trump is treating the press unfairly."

The co-director of the Harvard-Harris poll is Mark Penn, who was a strategist/pollster for Ed Koch (1977/1985) and Hillary Clinton's early presidential ambition (2008).
 
Winston said:
Trumpers think all polls are fake, so what makes this one true?
Click to expand...

It's as simple as the GOP continues to use the Nixon book of the southern strategy, demonize the media while linking them to DEMs, raise the the DEM negatives with tens of millions of hit ads as we saw to Quist, link every DEM to the GOP's favorite bogeymen as is now happening ;
 
reinoe said:
I have serious doubts. The MSM still thinks it's their duty to tell people what to think.
Click to expand...

I am curious, do you consider FOX to be mainstream media?
 
eohrnberger said:
Yes, fake news is coming home to roost, and the majority of the electorate identify it, and apparently don't buy it.

The media outlets should pay attention to this new development, assessing their credibility with the electorate.

What do you think? How do you see it?
Click to expand...

Trust in the media is now down to 32% who say they have "a great deal" or "a fair amount" of trust.

Americans' Trust in Mass Media Sinks to New Low | Gallup

Back in 1976, 76% of all Americans trusted the media and as late as 2005 half of all Americans trusted the media. So why the drop? What is different today than in 1976 or even 2005? I think that most see the media has taken sides especially in politics. The media just doesn't report an event, a happening, just the facts, but always seem to throw their own views into it or worst yet, slant it. Not surprisingly, 51% of Democrats today trust the media to only 14% of Republicans. Most major TV news is slanted and with the exception of FOX, it is slanted and in some cases very extremely like MSNBC in the Democrat's favor.

Of course the Democrats will point to Fox and say the same thing which they would be right. But one network biased toward the Republicans pale when one looks at the total picture of CNN, MSNBC, the three over the air networks, PBS and others.

Perhaps it is time for the media to stop pushing their agenda and begin just reporting the news and leaving biases out of it.
 
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